So Metal

When my son found out he had leukemia, he had one question "Can we still see Metallica?"

- BY CHRIS MALLINOS

THE ONLY THING worse than learning our 11-year-old son had leukemia was having to tell him. Yet there we were, my wife, Amanda, and I, sitting on Theo's hospital bed, explaining the unimaginable. Gently, we told him that his blood wasn’t working the way it should—that’s why he had been feeling so tired. We said he’d have to leave school so doctors could start treating him right away.

In an instant, his life fell apart.

I remember putting my hand on Theo’s back in an attempt to comfort him. Or maybe it was to ground myself as the room began to spin. I watched his eyes stare blankly ahead as he began to process the terrible news, his small shoulders hunched forward. I tried desperately to keep my composure.

A silent moment passed. Then Theo asked, “Can we still see Metallica?”

That may seem like an odd response from a kid who just found out he has cancer, but Theo is an avid drummer, and music is his life. We'd had tickets to see Metallica—his favourite band—for months.

In that moment on that hospital bed, getting Theo to that concert became my one overriding goal. There were 65 days between his diagnosis and the show—not a lot of time to get him to a state where he could go. So in the weeks that followed, in every meeting with every doctor and nurse, I told them about Metallica. I needed them to understand that attending that concert meant preserving a glimmer of joy in the darkest days of Theo’s life.